Seven years ago today we lost the actor who made us believe a Man Could Fly. In a celebration of the man and his achievements I present four of the best volumes chronicling his rise to stardom through to his tragic accident and finally to leaving a legacy –
The first of these is a vintage paperback Christopher Reeve charting the actor’s meteoric rise to fame by Margery Steinberg. While this is composed mainly of gossip-magazine style trash it still has some nice pictures in the centre and is fairly rare today.
Sadly the larger biographies would come as a result of renewed interest in Reeve due to his paralysis, the first, ‘Man Of Steel’ competently written by Adrian Havill nonetheless portrays Reeve as an ambitious but charismatic individual, concentrating on his acting career. The third volume, ‘Superhero’ by music journalist Chris Nickson is a more straightforward but well-researched bio spliced with decent b&w photos.
Reeve himself set the record straight in 1998 with his powerful autobiography Still Me, a touching reflection of his new life in a wheelchair with long flashbacks of a glittering career. Reeve pulls no punches with his views of both politics and his work to portray a humble family man refusing to accept his fate lightly while providing hope for others well beyond his years.
Rest In Peace, Toph…
The ‘Movie Tie-In’ novel was a familiar and obligatory item of merchandise issued to coincide with most of the Blockbusters of the 70’s and 80’s. Usually written economically and with little flair they were often more prized for the photo galleries adorning the centre pages.
Despite appearances, the novels shown in the top two pics are not literary transitions of Superman: The Movie nor Superman II due to the mess of litigation regarding story ownership (also impeding a comic-book adaptation) and are instead alternative takes on the origin story and other adventures by comic-writer Eliot S! Maggin.
A change of writers for the sequels permitted more standard releases and in the case of Superman III Author William Kotzwinkle (E.T.) an injection of a more adult tone into the screenplay by peppering the dialogue with such gems as ‘Holy ‘O Shitcakes’ and suchlike. By stark contrast, B.B. Hiller’s Novelisation of Superman IV is virtually a ‘Young readers version’ akin to the Star Wars novels. Decades later the nostalgic quaintness of these publications is surpassed by the desire to see Mario Puzo’s script for Superman’s I&II collected as an epic Godfather-esque novel. Stranger things have happened…
These photographs shot only last week at the Ani-Com & Games Guangzhou reveal a very interesting development with the Superman: The Movie figure on display in the ever-popular Hot Toys booth –
Check the Super Figures/statues history of this blog for thorough coverage of this long-awaited offering and you’ll see more photographs of the prototype, and later a small campaign initiated by SUPERMANIA in an attempt to highlight potential improvements. With the figure slated as having a Q4 release and expected within the coming months, it would appear Hot Toys has typically risen to fans expectations and reworked the headsculpt in advance!
Master sculptor Arnie Kim had already acknowledged concerns about the prototype in a recent post on Facebook with a cryptic message telling us not to worry as ‘Hot Toys is perfect’ (sic) which did indeed hint there would be a revision before production…
September 25th would have been Christopher Reeve’s 59th birthday.
Still sorely missed his influence and spirit are stronger than ever seen through the eyes of his offspring as they continue to campaign for his beloved cause while we watch them grow to be the echo of their father. You can join them in honouring his legacy and life by visiting this this page and making a contribution.
One can only imagine how proud our Superman must be of them and of the fact he is remembered with such affection. We still believe…
Pictured above – Pages culled from Japan Screen magazine of Christopher Reeve’s promotional tour for Superman: The Movie…
Startling in their primitive simplicity yet state of the art for the time, the models pictured above were given as a post-production gift to a lucky fan by the legendary Derek Meddings.
Still in the hands of that same collector more than thirty years later, they are a fine example of the craftsmanship associated with old-school film making. Meddings, (1931-1995) was nothing less than the Godfather of the industry with his work on both Superman: The Movie and Superman II among some of his most accomplished. Elegantly documented in the book ‘Special Effects Superman’ you may be surprised just how many big effects sequences in popular Films & TV he was directly responsible for and the influence he has to this day.
Photographed next to a penny for scale, the Superman flying miniature was most likely production made rather than screen used potentially as a stand-in. The radar dishes, however, come directly from the Eiffel Tower ‘maxiture’ as evidenced by the screengrab (bottom pic, upper right). This was one of the many detailed pieces made to furnish the 75ft tall tower constructed from various metals and shot on the backlot of Pinewood Studios. Legend has it after shooting the model was held in such high regard it was re-located to the Pinewood Gardens, where it was to become a permanent feature. Sadly as it was within the vicinity of the bar, it was destroyed due to a drunken employee’s attempt to climb it, King-Kong style…
My sincere thanks to SuperFan Steve Cambden for the use of these images…
